Joy Division – Love Will Tear Us Apart

I bought the single at a vinyl market and the seller told me that it was the promo version of the 7''. Maybe he lied to me,
but the disc is missing the label on the b-side, and the label on side a is ''bubbly''.

I grew up with these guys, and as any die-hard fan knows, compared to all their other singles, this is the worst one they ever made - lyrically great, of course, but that melody ! - it sounds like a failed attempt at a pop song.....

i have two copies, both original factory versions: one black vinyl and one translucent red (like the UP lp)

I have a 7" version of this that does not conform to the variations listed. It has:

Glossy sleeve
Rounded cut-out
Straight flipbacks
A1/B1 Runout

Can anybody help to identify it??

40 short years ago, and as fresh now as it ever was. I bought the 7" on it's day of release. My friends and I always trawled around every record shop in town to find the 'most mint, the one with the elusive paper label glossy card sleeve' etc. We were fussy lads! Anyway all copies of this had matt card sleeves - so that is the one I own to this day!

Hey, I have a record where the label on the B Side is missing (probably a 1980 UK pressing). Does anybody know how rare or how much that would sell?

Looking through some vinyl the other day, this record, a song I haven’t listened to in what seems nearly a lifetime, found it’s way into my hands. It’s not often that I find myself sitting on the floor, unconsciously caressing a record sleeve ... but it seems that long lost, and half forgotten memories were swirling up at me. This was a very difficult time in my life, I had a lot on my plate, a lot I wanted to forget, a life I wanted to numb out of existence, and “Love Will Tear Us Apart” was the soundtrack for those days. Each morning began the same, draw the blinds, take a Tuinal, drop this album on the turntable, get a bath, and then stumble headlong into the day. Joy Division made it easy to be self-destructive, Joy Division made it easy for splintered lives to become even more fractured, and this song ripped its way into the very nature of my being.

“Love Will Tear Us Apart” is as essential as The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s album. The song doesn’t so much reside on this piece of wax, it’s more that the record is merely a conduit for the song to be beamed in from outer space, and with each playing, as the record gained more and more surface noise, which only added and aided the mystery ... the music began deconstructing, becoming less complete, and yet more compelling with each revolution. If this were the only number Joy Division had ever recorded, it would be enough to give them a permeant place in musical history. The song is simple in it’s complexity, it’s haunting melody is almost childlike, and there are times I sang it sitting on the edge of my children’s bed, lulling them to sleep. Make no mistake, this song spirals inward, it draws your energy, you will sink lower into the chair, and you’ll want to play it for anyone who has ever been careless with your heart. Yet with all of that, there is a translucent beauty found here, and essential truth stated so matter-of-factly, that it can not be ignored.

Many have said that “Love Will Tear Us Apart” is the ultimate suicide song, but it’s not, it can’t be, because no one can play this song once. Each playing reveals something new, distills another emotion, and allows greater emotional feelings to make your heart swell to the point of bursting ... and to feel these things, one must be alive. I remember being in Bosnia filling out reports late into the night in a small make-shift medical center just off Sniper Alley, with the song playing quietly on my tiny cassette player. I hadn’t even noticed that one of my patients, a young man who spoke no formal English, was standing behind me, he tapped on the cassette player and I restarted the song, he stood there with his eyes closed crying, and then so did I ... I held him for a moment before taking him back to his cot, and I never played the song again.

Some things are eternal for as long as they last ... "Love Will Tear Us Apart" will be circling the globe for all time.

Review by Jenell Kesler

I’ve got the above single but there is also a flexidisc with it with “Incubation” on it. I don’t see that mentioned anywhere on here? Any info on this?

I much prefer Atmosphere. Why do I have to write ten words?

I have a white vinyl with Leaders of Men as the B1 and a rough cut of Love Will Tear Us Apart on the other... Is there a way to request some be added to the site?